Lusotana Campaign

[athanaric]

Luso's are very powerful. And the cost should be compared against the fact that you are sitting in one of the richest area's of the map.

With one of the weakest tech trees in the game. Sure you'll roll in cash once you've united Iberia, but there is always the nagging feeling that SPQR or Carthage could make five times the money by doing the same thing. Kinda irrational, I know, but I'm just that focused on economy.

once you get those mines up and running but thats easier said than done. anyway cost should be related to equipment and training. upkeep to being irregular, regular or elite (in the end that is usually similar to length of training and quality of equipment). and this is generally well balanced in EB, but the romans are a weird exception.

Roman units are "balanced differently" to reflect the idiosyncrasies of their faction's military policy. Maybe somebody else can come up with a more detailed response. Apart from that, elite units such as Ambakaro are quite expensive to raise for a people with limited economical and technological capabilities - you need hand-crafted high quality arms and armour for each of those soldiers, which is easier said than done, even taking into account advanced Celtic metalworking techniques. All the more as there needs to be a solid economical base for these undertakings.
And don't forget the AP bonus of falcatas, which gives your units quite an edge versus Roman units. In my experience, Lusitanian and other Iberian units are quite decent against Roman and Carthaginian armies. It's other barbarians they have problems with. Sure you can decimate those Gauls with javelins, but once they are upon you even the (mid-tier) Bataroas will eat through any of your units with little effort, thanks to equal skill combined with superior lethality. And no armour to speak of, rendering your AP advantage useless. Also, their fear units. TBH I've had little trouble defeating the Lusotannan with Swêboz, Casse, or Aedui. Those battles are mainly annoying due to hardcoded issues, i.e. skirmishing related bugs and the AI's retarded but effective habit to throw missiles in close combat.

[The Stranger]

i understand that the roman military works different than the lusotannan, but atleast early on it works pretty much as the greek states (not carthage cuz they relied on foreign mercs mostly) and the greek states core infantry is still a lot more expensive than the roman core infantry.

[Brave Brave Sir Robin]

i understand that the roman military works different than the lusotannan, but atleast early on it works pretty much as the greek states (not carthage cuz they relied on foreign mercs mostly) and the greek states core infantry is still a lot more expensive than the roman core infantry.

Roman recruitment is completely different from Greek recruitment. If we take the Greek city-states for example, they could never hope to match the manpower Rome could call upon anytime in our timeframe and perhaps 100 years earlier. The larger Hellenistic powers focused more on training for small cores of, undoubtedly well-trained Macedonians and Greeks, but focused much less on the arming and training of native populations. Therefore, the core of their armies were still limited in size, unlike those of the Romans who deployed their Italian allies in much the same way as their own legions. The fact that Rome could suffer consecutive crushing defeats (i.e. Second Punic War) and still field large armies speaks to how successful they were in this respect.

[team_kramnik]

Romans get a flat 20% to represent their big and rich middleclass. A class that had mostly disappeared in greek society by 280 BC. Apart from javelin throwing and charge Iberian units get better stamina and the ability to hide in long grass. This makes them lots of fun imo but cost-effective they are not. They also play more like greek infantry with specialist roles like skirmish (Iabarannta, Caetranann), defense (Gestikapoinann, Scortamareva) and assault (Caetrati, Ambakaro, Roscaithrera).

As attack infantry in your factional roster Ambakaro are your only option. But 2 of them are usually enough to wipe out whole armies provided the enemy is pinned and they get some javelin support. I have no other EB unit seen kill as fast as Ambakaro. And yes swordunits get faster attack though it differs from unit to unit.

In general for attack pick units with a dense formation. Caetrannan have absolutly terrible killrates thanks to their loose formation. But humble Caetrati are good enough to flank a late roman army thanks to high attack speed, resonable good formation and ap swords. Against lightly armored enemies it might be a better idea to use a longsword unit like Roscaithrera or Milites Ilergetum. Units with lots of light javelins like Iabarannta should do well too.

Edit: Unit Skeletons which give an idea about attack speed

dunaminaca
skeleton fs_javelinman, fs_swordsman

scortamavera
skeleton fs_javelinman, fs_o_f_spearman

roscaithrera
skeleton fs_fast_javelinman_big, fs_fast_swordsman_big

ilergeta
skeleton fs_fast_javelinman, fs_fast_swordsman_barb

asturainaxemen
skeleton fs_fast_javelinman, fs_fast_swordsman_barb_slash

Dosidataskeli
skeleton fs_javelinman_big, fs_slow_spearman_big

caetratii
skeleton fs_fast_javelinman, fs_fast_swordsman_barb

iberian_infantry_milites
skeleton fs_fast_javelinman, fs_fast_spearman

scutarii
skeleton fs_fast_javelinman, fs_fast_spearman

loricati_scutarii
skeleton fs_javelinman, fs_swordsman_barb

gestikapoinann
skeleton fs_fast_javelinman, fs_fast_o_f_spearman

ambakaro
skeleton fs_semi_fast_javelinman, fs_semi_fast_swordsman_barb

iberian_missile_velites
skeleton fs_fast_javelinman, fs_fast_spearman

Iabarannta, Gaesamica
skeleton fs_fast_javelinman, fs_fast_spearman

caetranann
skeleton fs_fast_javelinman, fs_fast_swordsman_barb

iovamann
skeleton fs_fast_javelinman, fs_fast_swordsman

northern_skirmisher_siluri
skeleton fs_fast_javelinman, fs_fast_o_f_spearman

[athanaric]

I'm fairly certain that Roscaithrera have "normal" swords with 0.13 lethality. Milites Ilergetum are excellent, though.

[konny]

TBH I've had little trouble defeating the Lusotannan with Swêboz, Casse, or Aedui. Those battles are mainly annoying due to hardcoded issues, i.e. skirmishing related bugs and the AI's retarded but effective habit to throw missiles in close combat.

I can only confirm that. In my last Roman campaign I quited when I was at constant war with Lusotans, the Aedui, the Dacians and Carthago for some twenty years.

Of those four opponents the Lustonas looked best but fought worst. Their bodyguard it rather pathetical; no match even for Eqvites, and a joke in combat compared to the battletanks of the other three factions. When this faction has no access to the east coast of Spain it is not able to raise any other cavalry of note. And that also is to be raised from regional MICs.

Balearic Slingers are only available as mercs, in return they get access to dunno how many javeleeners, of which the AI loves to raise each and every of them. Then there's a bunch somewhat mid-to-low-level spearmen, of which I have the impression that all have an extremly low moral - when attacking the Spanish units have a tendency to break much faster even than Lugoae.

The only unit that was able to deliver at least some damage were the Scortamareva. The Ambakaro are simply to few in a unit to not go gown under a salvo of pila or the attack of a fresh unit of Pedites Extraordinarii.

[moonburn]

you should use the hillfort soldiers and the illergetes and the iberian medium cavarly and even the basque ultra armoured if you can get them back into the game if you only use lusitanian native troops ofc you´re going to be missing alot of diversity you must use the iberian full rooster and not just the lusitanian native rooster

[The Stranger]

well the iberian heavy cav is good, but like i have pointed out the heaviest iberian infantry, the loricata scutarii is no match for even polybian hastati (cost-effectiveness that is, they are slightly better individually but at 2x the cost, and they will get owned by 2 hastati easy). im not debating the historical accurateness of this, but i was just a bit dissapointed, even more so when i found out that the dosidataskeli were taken out, a unit so awesome it would tip the balance back in their favor. i have modded them back in but somehow the feeling has gone. and yes the epones ambakaro (and generals bodyguard) were a big dissapoinment.

[Brave Brave Sir Robin]

Ambakaro Epones (and most sword wielding javelin cavalry) is underwhelming for several reasons.
1. Cavalry secondaries are too weak compared to lances. It is actually better to use the lance in vanilla EB. We added +3 attack across the board for cavalry secondaries for MP.
2. Javelin cavalry missile attacks are poor. 8 javs for each man in the unit isn't going to do much damage at all with their current attack modifier. For MP we added +'s depending on the unit considering the extra momentum a jav would get being thrown from a moving horse.
3. Again falcatas and kopides are weak compared to axes. Raising lethality on these weapons is a good idea.

After implementing these three factors across the board for all cavalry, I found Ambakaro Epones to be one of, if not the best anti-heavy cavalry unit in game. Without this, they are a crap unit that costs an arm and a leg. Most other skirmisher cavalry without spears are the same way. Although there are some changes in MP that might not be for everyone, these changes are relatively needed to make a lot of units in SP worthwhile, especially the sidearm using skirmisher cavalry.

[konny]

you should use the hillfort soldiers and the illergetes and the iberian medium cavarly and even the basque ultra armoured if you can get them back into the game if you only use lusitanian native troops ofc you´re going to be missing alot of diversity you must use the iberian full rooster and not just the lusitanian native rooster

Not me. I am talking about that faction being run by the AI and that way has about the worst line-up in the entire mod.

I myself had only once started a campaign with them, but also quitted very fast because of the extremly limited possibilities in recruiting anything good in the starting provinces. I think that was before the sheppard slingers made it in and you had absolutly no missle from the MICs.

[Lysimachos]

Not me. I am talking about that faction being run by the AI and that way has about the worst line-up in the entire mod.

That's an interesting point considering that Lusotannan AI does exceptionally well against other AI factions.

[The Stranger]

in almost all my campaigns i have seen them losing vs the romans and carthage tho :S

(i did give rome a boost tho by increasing their numbers of all infantry to 60/240)

[Ca Putt]

I assume this is because of their AP bonus which apparently is valued high in autocalc.

[team_kramnik]

I'm fairly certain that Roscaithrera have "normal" swords with 0.13 lethality. Milites Ilergetum are excellent, though.

True, my bad.

Not me. I am talking about that faction being run by the AI and that way has about the worst line-up in the entire mod.

I myself had only once started a campaign with them, but also quitted very fast because of the extremly limited possibilities in recruiting anything good in the starting provinces. I think that was before the sheppard slingers made it in and you had absolutly no missle from the MICs.

A Lusotann army is very capable:

Iovamann: cheap garrison

iabarannta: Javelinners are great! They kill weakly armored enemies, stall most attackers or chase light cav.

caetranann: They look cool. Am I the only one who picks units like that? They have a bad formation but that can be neutralized by letting them fight with other units. They also have 6 javelins.

Gestikapoinann: Solid, fast and cheap spearmen. Great addition to flanking teams and good enough to hold most sections of a line.

Scortamareva: One of the most heavily armored line-units and they can keep up with a Luso army.

Ambakaro: Long range javelins, high morale and ap swords. Deadly assault unit. Don't let them become the target of heavy javelins or a heavy infantry charge. But you also don't use your FMs to frontally charge a phalanx line, do you? Also don't let them throw javelins when using them as assault troops.

Ambakaro Epones: They are not weaker than similar units like Hetairoi Aspidophoroi or Tarentines. High price is not a problem as Luso armies should be mostly infantry and you get them for free as Bodyguards. Of course you can raise their stats and let your medium cavalry cut down cataphracts. And then conquer entire empires with just 2 units of FMs. That they need a boost in mp is of course reasonable.

Lusotannan units all have their uses. They just lack units who are good at everything so it's no surprise the ai misuses them.

[Nightmare]

anyway cost should be related to equipment and training. upkeep to being irregular, regular or elite (in the end that is usually similar to length of training and quality of equipment). and this is generally well balanced in EB, but the romans are a weird exception.

Depends on what you mean by "generally well balanced." Across the board, units get less and less cost efficient as you climb the tech tree. By the time you've hit "elite" you are well into "grotesquely cost inefficient."

well the iberian heavy cav is good, but like i have pointed out the heaviest iberian infantry, the loricata scutarii is no match for even polybian hastati (cost-effectiveness that is, they are slightly better individually but at 2x the cost, and they will get owned by 2 hastati easy).

Yup, here you are running into the "cost effectiveness issue" I outlined above. Works that way with every faction.

You are always better building levee units as any faction rather than teching up and building anything else. Since I personally don't like playing the game with nothing but generic levee spears or whatever, I "corrected" the issue by taking the stats that the MP folks use and applying them to single player. This seemed to generally improve cost-effectiveness by a fair bit across the board for all factions as you tech up.

If you are interested in the modifications, just PM me. They would be a serious pain to do by hand but I've already edited the file and can send it to whoever wants it.

[The Stranger]

i was talking about the cost balanced to their status, not the cost balanced to their skill or usefullness.

well one thing ive always wondered about is defense skill, you have some mountain irregulars with higher defense skill than some heavily trained elites. and some superior or even elite faction units such as the pontikoi thorakitai or the ptolemaic galation guard unit with lower morale or equal morale as a normal levy... but eb just has too many units for me to bother with rebalancing stuff like that :P

i do like what they have done with charges and missile units. strong from the side but alot weaker from the front.

levies are quite good its true, definitly the archer spearmen and the phalanx ones but comparably units such as the thorakitai are most definitly very cost efficient. and 1 hetairo will still kill 2 prodromois or light cav which are half the price in a frontal charge.


but ye early on you can better spam cheap units but in campaign you will reach a point where you have so much money to spend it doesnt matter what u build. and also the point of elite units is more their morale and shock power than cost effectiveness. when the line is wavering you want to throw in your elite units to break the enemy or hold your own line. ofcourse the brunt of your army would be this low level trooper

but perhaps raising their unit from 30 to 40 would balance it out?



i just ran a quick test

1 spartiate = roughly 4 haploi in both cost and upkeep

1 vs 4 the spartan loses

2 vs 8 the spartans win


both times i allowed myself to be surrounded. i lost all my spartans the first time and 71% the second time. but they are definitly worth the money but just require special use and thats quite historical.